Arctic has unveiled a version of its legendary Freezer 50 cooler for mainstream AMD and Intel processors. This massive cooler weighs nearly 2.6 pounds (1.2 kilograms), has two fans, and promises to stay quiet even at reasonably high loads. The Freezer 50 launches just in time for AMD’s enthusiast-grade Ryzen 5000-series CPUs that will be available this November.
The original Arctic Freezer 50 TR cooler was designed for AMD’s Ryzen Threadripper processors which can dissipate up to 280W at stock and a lot more when overclocked. Most owners of Threadripper systems use liquid coolers as they are concerned about properly cooling their power-hungry CPUs running at high clocks. This means that there are only a few air coolers for sTR4 processors on the market. Given the typical use cases of AMD’s Ryzen Threadripper, all of these air coolers are designed with overclocking in mind, so they can dissipate significantly more than 280 W. Applying this design to ‘mega coolers’ aimed at more mainstream CPUs will naturally give them a lot of headroom for overclocking. In fact, keeping in mind that AMD wants its Ryzen 5000-series CPUs with a TDP higher than 65 W to be cooled using a rather potent 280-mm all-in-one liquid cooling system or an ‘equivalent’ air cooling system, Arctic launches its Freezer 50 at the very right time.
Indeed, the Arctic Freezer 50 promises to offer performance comparable to that of AIO liquid coolers. The unit comes with a gigantic dual-tower heatsink featuring 104 0.4-mm aluminum fins as well as six U-shaped 6-mm heat pipes that form a direct-touch base which covers the whole surface of a CPU’s IHS.
The cooler uses two fluid dynamic bearing fans of different sizes — a 120-mm one and a 140-mm one — to maximize airflow and therefore increase performance. Arctic says that depending on the load, the 120-mm fan rotates at 200 ~ 1800 RPM, whereas the 140-mm fan rotates at 200 ~ 1700 RPM, so the cooler should be utterly quietly under light and even medium loads. Arctic claims that noise level produced by the cooler at max speeds should not exceed 0.4 Sone (23.5~25 dBA).
Arctic’s Freezer 50 cooler is compatible with all modern mainstream platforms, including AMD’s AM4 as well as Intel’s LGA1200, LGA2066, LGA115x, and LGA2011-3 sockets. As far as dimensions are concerned, the Arctic’s Freezer 50 measures 5.8 x 5.9 x 6.5 inches (148×149.5×166 mm), just like its counterpart for Threadripper processors, so it will be compatible with the vast majority of spacious cases designed for enthusiasts. It also leaves a memory module clearance of 37.5 mm to maximize compatibility with high-end DRAM sticks.
Since modern enthusiast-grade hardware should not only offer high performance, but also look flashy, the Freezer 50 comes with 13 A-RGB LEDs that can be controlled using software from leading makers of motherboards.
The Arctic Freezer 50 is already available directly from the company in Europe for €59.99, including VAT. The cooler will probably hit major retailers in the coming weeks.
